Who has high ground in Escondido suit against widow?

Escondido is suing an 87-year-old widow for as much as $876,000 for a mistake on the woman’s water bill that was made 14 years ago not by the widow but by the city itself. The city apparently thinks it has the moral and legal high ground. Really?

There are multiple sides to every argument; maybe U-T columnist Logan Jenkins missed something in his piece outlining the case of Escondido vs. Sylvia Clark. Maybe, for example, widow Clark and her sons, who took over management of the family avocado ranch after the death of Clark’s husband in 2007, knew all along that they were ripping off the city for lots of free water. Didn’t they ever talk to neighbor ranchers and discover the neighbors’ bills were far higher? After all, the city’s suit puts the blame squarely on the Clarks. “Wrongful conduct,” the suit says. Never mind that Jenkins reports that one of Clark’s sons says he went to City Hall several times to inquire about the water bills because he believed they were too high, not too low. The city’s mistake — repeat, the city’s mistake — still wasn’t discovered.

Message to Escondido: You don’t have the moral high ground here. Do you want to take an 87-year-old widow to trial to see if you have the legal high ground? Really?